Beatrice and Murray Dryer are raising holy hell at the Whole Foods Market – because, incredibly, she’s been banned for life from New York City’s biggest gourmet food store.

Beatrice, 81, is Public Enemy No. 1 at the spectacular new supermarket in the Time Warner Center and could face instant arrest if she sets foot inside.

Store officials insist they have a good reason for declaring the elderly Manhattanite off-limits – claiming she snatched a piece of chocolate cake and some cheese without paying.

But the retired antiques dealer says she’s been falsely accused and plans to fight the Big Apple’s red-hot, mall-sized market tooth and nail.

“I think they’re crazy, accusing me of stealing. I wouldn’t put myself out on a limb for a piece of cheese,” Beatrice told The Post.

There are two sides to every story and Dryer’s version is that security guards pounced on her before she was able to pay for the food.

But store officials insist they intervened only after the elderly shopper passed by a register with the dessert in tow without paying for it.

Beatrice said the nasty incident occurred after she and her husband, Murray, 83, finished eating a prepared dinner they’d bought earlier at Whole Foods at a table set up for in-store diners just past the registers.

After she returned to the store to get dessert, Beatrice said she walked back over to Murray with her selections in tow to get some money from him to pay.

“I was carrying a piece of chocolate cake and a few slices of cheese – the next thing I knew I was surrounded by security guards,” she said.

She said a guard from Elite Security – a private firm hired by Whole Foods – told her he’d been eyeing her trying to stuff cake and cheese under her coat.

“I wasn’t even wearing a coat,” Beatrice fumed. “Four guards came to me. They said, ‘Let’s go! Right this minute!’ ”

One of the guards retrieved her husband and they were marched down a long corridor into a back room where she was grilled for half an hour – then forced to sign a statement saying she’d never return to the store, she said.

The Dryers are so worked up over the March 29 incident, they’ve hired a lawyer to sue for $5,000 unless Whole Foods lifts the ban and issues an apology.

But John Marsh, Whole Foods store-team leader, said the Dryers are telling a tall tale – one that’s a different story from what really happened.

“What she did is called ‘willful concealment,’ ” Marsh insisted. (p.7 Metro)